Dooe-lock



UNITED sTATEs PATENT oEEicE.

J. EDVARD PARKER, OF WEST MERIDEN, CONNECTICUT.

DOOR-LOCK.

Speccation of Letters Patent No. 30,586, dated November 6, 1860.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, J. EDWARD PARKER, ot vWest Meriden, New Haven county, Connecticut, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Door-Locks; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and eXact description of the same, reference being made to the annexed draw ings, making a part of this specification, which are fully described herein, and in which similar letters indicate similar parts throughout the figures.

This invention has reference especially to the door locks known as mortise locks and which are .sometimes required to be so made that each lock can be used either a cright hand or a left hand lock, as the position of the door to which it is to be affixed may demand. Hitherto the only method by which the lock could be used for either side at pleasure has been, to take the lock apart and turn over the latch bolt as well as all the parts which operate it, but this involves such accurate tting of the several parts in making the lock that the cost is considerably increased. It is also known that all who' athx the locks are not competent to take them apart and change the interior, and hence the dealers are under the necessity of keeping larger stocks on hand in order to provide both right and left hand locks, not knowing which will be most required.

My improvement lies in a. manner of so constructing the lock, that it may be rea-dily reversed without requiring to be opened, and at but a triling cost over an ordinary lock of the same general character, while it can also be used by any mechanic of sufcient ability to screw the lock to the door; and it consists in making the latch bolt itself so that it can be separated from its operating parts and can be again secured thereto in a reversed position.

In the annexed drawings (a,) Figures I and II, exhibits the head7 of the latch bolt, (o) the tail part and (o) the follower. The head of the latch bolt is so constructed that it can be inserted into a mortise in the tail part and secured there by a screw, as shown at (d) as thus made it is immaterial whether it be inserted as seen in the solid lines in Fig. I, or, as in the reverse position shown by the dot-ted lines in the same figure. In the one po sition it will make a'right hand, and in the other a left hand lock. In order to change this from one to the other, when requisite, there is provided a hole at (e) through the side plate of the lock, and then, on pushing back the bolt, the head of the screw (d), being immediately under it, can be reached and readily taken out by a screw driver, the latch taken out and turned over, the screw re-inserted, and the lock will have been thereby reversed.

In Fig. III is shown another form of latch bolt, but of the same general principle as already described, in which the return spring is within the body of the bolt itself. In this the head of the bolt (a) is atlxed upon a tenon made upon the body, the screw (d) being taken out, when reversing is desired, through an aperture in the side plate at that part of the lock, as at (e).

I claim- The herein described mode of constructing a reversible door lock-that is to sayby so making the head of the latch bolt in a separate piece and connecting it with the follower that the said head may be taken out and reversed at pleasure without disturbing any of the other parts, substantially as set forth.

J EDWARD PARKER.

litnesses EMERY PARKER, I-I. J. P. WHIPPLE. 

